Haynesville Shale

Drillers and dealers have been returning to the Haynesville and Eagle Ford shales, which have seen rising rig counts and an increase in merger and acquisition (M&A) activity of late. Enterprise Products Partners LP management has been watching.

While it leaned on the Appalachian Basin to drive production and benefited from an improved market to deliver solid financial results, Range Resources Corp. had a busy first quarter in North Louisiana, where it has been learning more about the Cotton Valley Sands Terryville Complex.

The oil/natural gas patch has seen much technological change since 2010 — the last time the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) assessed the resources contained in the Bossier and Haynesville formations. Technology advancements have caused resource estimates for the Gulf Coast Basin plays to balloon.

BHP Billiton should jettison its U.S. petroleum business (offshore and on), which is undervalued by the market, does not contribute value to the company and does not mesh with BHP’s traditional mining operations, an activist shareholder said Monday in a letter to company directors.

U.S. land permit filings rose 27% month/month in February and were 78% higher year/year at 3,211, the highest monthly permit total since November 2015 and the first February/February jump since 2014, according to data compiled by Evercore ISI.

Houston-based EOG Resources Inc. plans to grow overall company crude oil volumes by 18% this year while keeping spending and dividends within cash flow at a $50/bbl average oil price, the company said.

Successful drilling in the re-emerging Haynesville Shale was the highlight of 2016 for Frisco, TX-based Comstock Resources Inc. The company is sticking around in the North Louisiana play for more this year.

Data from the latest Baker Hughes Inc. (BHI) rig count shows drillers going back to the Granite Wash of the Texas Panhandle and western Oklahoma. They’re also continuing their return to Louisiana’s Haynesville Shale.

Dallas-based Matador Resources Co. flagged initial test results from three Permian Basin wells in Lea County, NM, which in aggregate over 24 hours flowed 7,856 boe/d, consisting of 7,172 b/d of crude and 4.1 MMcf/d of natural gas.